This Is What You Should Practice If You Are An Intermediate-Level Italian Learner

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Open any grammar textbook intended for language learning, and this is what you'll find in it: present tense of all verbs, pronouns, prepositions (each one explained in all its numerous functions), passato prossimo (often explained wrong), imperfetto (usually explained wrong), prepositions-articles blend, present and perfect future tense, present and perfect conditional tense, subjunctive in all its four tenses, hypothetical sentences (all explained wrong), imperative, passive construction, comparative sentences, relative pronouns and sentences, gerund forms, etc.

How anyone can open a language textbook, get flooded over with hundreds of structures and elements, and feel encouraged to actually start that journey is beyond me. Top that off with the fact that language teachers don't generally possess the required competencies to relate language to speech. In other words, they can't teach learners how to apply what they assimilate, which is gone and forgotten shortly after.

Think of language learning as going to the gym. Imagine you've never lifted before. It's a new experience, but it's now time to look beach great. So what do you do? Go to the gym and start working out every single muscle fiber in your body? No. You're going to tend to the main muscle groups first. For a while you're going to focus on pects, lats, biceps, triceps, shoulders, quads, and calves. This is what sticks out. Build these muscles up and achieve width first. The rest comes later.

A language works in a similar way. You don't need to practice the future tense within your first year because in Italian we don't use it like you think we do. You don't need to worry about the conditional because you can communicate fairly well without.

This is not to say--mark my word--that you must not learn certain structures. You can and you will--but do it at the right time. The problem is that schools and teachers throw everything into a big cauldron, mix it up, and then offer it to students to practice it in a wrong way and in a random fashion. If you know all the theory behind trapassato congiuntivo but can't say a simple sentence in the present tense without doubt or hesitation--let alone mistakes--there's a clear methodological problem right there.

These are the main language muscle groups you need to develop in order to speak Italian at a high intermediate level once you have taken care of the basics (masculine/feminine singular/plural agreement, subject pronouns, definite and indefinite articles).

1) Presente indicativo.

2) Stare + gerund.

3) Courtesy form (addressing someone formally)

4) Direct object pronouns.

5) Indirect object pronouns.

6) Pronoun "ne" and "ci".

7) Passato prossimo.

8) Imperfetto.

9) Pronoun "si" + third person singular / plural.

10) Prepositions (especially "per", "da", "di", "a", "in").

11) Modal verbs ("potere", "dovere", "volere").

12) Reflexive verbs.

13) Sure, throw in the "imperativo"and "congiuntivo presente" (function of formal imperative) if you want.

This is what you should practice relentlessly during the first two years at least as an Italian learner. Your goal should be nothing short of technical fluency on points 1), 2), 3), 4), 7), 8), 9), and 11). Aim for complete ease and comfort on points 5), 6), 10). Your practice should be based on two essential elements: repetition out loud and memorization. Without these, you will reach a plateau very early on and either quit or feel very dissatisfied about your level.

Vocabulary--mark the preterition--is a goes-without-saying kind of thing. You need at least 4,000 words by the end of the two years. That's 37 words per week.

You need a method and clear, realistic, practical goals. If you can do this, learning the rest will be a walk in the park. You'll get such a motivation and self-confidence boost, you'll progress without much of an effort later.